When Christmas break finally rolled around Hermione was relieved. Her tutoring sessions were suspended for the moment, along with studies of her own. She had mad snowball fights on the lawn with Ron, Harry and Neville, but didn't mind warming up by the fire in her dormitory with hot chocolate and Draco's company either.

On Christmas morning she woke up with the pile of presents around the foot of her bed and felt torn. Draco lay gently snoozing and she knew that downstairs Ron and Harry were probably already tearing open gifts. After a moment of indecision she threw on a bathrobe and scrawled a quick note, leaving it on top of her gift for Draco, which read: "Going to the common room to open presents, but I'd like to be there when you open this. If you can withhold the temptation long enough I'll be back before noon.", and then swept all her presents up with her wand and floated them out of the room, closing the door behind her softly.

Harry and Ron had actually waited for her, assuming that they would carry on the tradition of unwrapping presents together. She tore open a very advanced and heavy spell book she'd been admiring in Flourish and Blotts from her parents, along with a set of socks. She'd received a scarf that appeared to be ten feet long from Dobby, a dark blue sweater and box of fudge from Mrs. Weasley, and Hagrid had given her a genuine dragon hide belt. From Harry was a wand care kit and a box of sherbet lemons from Honeydukes, and then she searched around, but saw nothing else. "Um…" Said Ron, his ears going purple, "I thought I might…Let you have it later…" He said.

She smiled, feeling a bit perplexed, and also a strange nervous jump in her chest as he said this, and nodded. "Okay."

She searched Harry's face for a possible explanation, but he was too absorbed in the "Famous Seekers" book she'd purchased for him in the "Quidditch" section of the bookstore. For Ron, Hermione had bought a large box of chocolate frogs, and also a golden amulet with a lion and a phoenix entwined around a polished red stone. "I don't know if it's real, considering what I paid at the shop." She said, smiling when he unwrapped it, "But the owner said it was charmed by a wizard in the 15th century, to give good luck to whoever bore it…Probably a load of rubbish…" She added, but he grinned widely. "I love it." He said.

After they'd talked and admired presents for a while, Hermione said she was going upstairs to change. She came into the room, and there on her bed was a small box wrapped in burgundy paper with a gold ribbon. There was a card on top that said, simply, "To Hermione." Once she'd changed she sat on the bed to open it. She untied the ribbon carefully and unwrapped the paper. It was a wooden box with a little hook that she unfastened to open the lid. What was inside took her breath away.

It was a miniature golden and bronze statue of a griffin. When she opened the box it was laying, curled up, its wings folded down and its head tucked beneath its wing. As light streamed inside it slipped its beaked head out and tossed its mane, yawning. It stretched its talons in front of it, and flexed its back claws as it stood and looked up. It let out a little screechy roar as it looked up at Hermione and cocked its head to the side curiously, stretching its wings. It couldn't have been more than four inches long and three inches high. It strutted about the small box and Hermione, scarcely daring to breathe, put her finger down into the corner. At first it seemed frightened, but then came over to it, and sniffed it, and then placed an experimental front claw onto her. When she stayed perfectly still, the next little claw was put onto her finger. She was amazed at how life-like it felt, as it moved up onto her hand. She lifted her arm slowly up from the box and it squealed a little nervously, flapping its wings. She grinned and let it wander around her palm and forearm, before setting her other hand a few inches away, and letting him fly over to it. She silently named him Godric as she watched him curiously smell and walk over the folds of her blankets when she set him on the bed.

She heard footsteps coming up the stairs and she carefully picked him up and, though he protested, placed him back in the box, and closed the lid. She dashed to the door and got to it just as it opened. Draco seemed taken aback as Hermione flung herself onto him in a hug. "Oh Draco, it's wonderful, I love it!" She said, pulling away and grinning from ear to ear. He smiled, seeming rather flustered, and said, "Well I guess you opened it then."

"Oh, but your present!" Hermione remembered suddenly, "Open it Draco…I don't know how it could compare to what you got me, but I think you might like it."

Draco sat down on his bed with the gift in his lap and carefully tore off the paper. Inside was a small black cardboard box. He opened it, and unwrapping the tissue, smiled. It was a silver cloak pin in the shape of a snake twined around itself into a beautiful Celtic knot, its eye made of a blue stone.

"I found it in an antique shop in Paris's magic community last summer…I bought it, but then realized it didn't really suit any of my friends at the time…" She said. "But…Then…Well, I thought it suited you alright."

He stood up with it in his hands and opened his wardrobe, pinning it to his cloak's collar.

"It's beautiful." He said softly. He was looking at her in a funny way, and she felt embarrassed, her cheeks turning pink. She stood up, all of the sudden the fluttering feeling that had been hiding in her stomach with Ron all this time seemed to be moving up her throat and into her brain as Draco smiled at her. She walked over to the wide doorway and Draco walked over too,

"Are you alright?" He asked.

"Yes." She replied, a bit too quickly after he asked, and found herself blushing more, though she didn't know why. Draco leaned back and looked up.

"Oh." He said rather abruptly.

"What?" Hermione said, leaning against the opposite doorframe.

"Nothing." Said Draco, his cheeks flushing as well.

Hermione looked up to see what he'd seen. Hanging above them in the doorframe was a sprig of mistletoe, the white berries gleaming in the torchlight, the green leaves bound together with a bright red ribbon. She looked back slowly and Draco stood up straight from leaning back. Hermione didn't know what force was pulling her…Something stronger than gravity. But she stood up too. Draco took a step forward, slipped a hand behind her ear and softly rested his other hand on her waist. She didn't know what was happening at first, it happened so fast, but then his face was inches away from hers. His eyes were so close…They were so blue. And then his eyes closed and hers did too, as their lips met softly.

Their kiss was broken short by a clattering sound and a thundering of stairs being taken quickly. Hermione looked down just in time to see Ron's red hair whipping around the corner, and a small box lying on the stairs, having been cast aside.

She looked at Draco who looked back at her, shock in both their eyes. "RON!" She called, and then taking a final look back at Draco, hurried down the stairs after him.

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